Dragon Age II

Dragon Age II is a framed story. Players experience the tale of the Champion of Kirkwall as Varric narrates it. There’s a definitive beginning, middle and end and that leaves little room for stories that BioWare could tell after the finale. The ending is vague and players don’t really know what happens to Hawke after the final confrontation in the city. On top of that, the multiple endings through a wrench into things and it left me wondering how the developers would fit the expected downloadable content in.

But hand it to BioWare for coming up with a clever way of introducing it. Players going through Dragon Age II Legacy, the first major story-based DLC, will see a special statue in Hawke’s home. (It’s either the fancy mansion or his hovel earlier in the game.) Legacy itself explores Hawke’s lineage. Sure, players know about the hero’s mother, but they know little about the champion’s father. The DLC sets out to answer those questions.

Dragon Age II has its flaws, but the ending isn’t one of them. In fact, it’s been stuck in my head recently because of the demise of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden. For those of you who haven’t finished the game, there are spoilers ahead. For those who have played the finale, you probably know what I’m talking about.

What fascinated me most about Dragon Age II is Anders and how he sets up the conflict that’s central to the game. It’s not about the blight or Darkspawn. Instead, the sequel focuses on the role of mages in Thedas. These potentially powerful beings are highly regulated because they have the potential to cause catastrophic damage.

Like all human beings they can be forces for good or evil, but because of their power, they’re treated as criminals, bound within the Circle of Magi and supervised by the Chantry. They’re controlled from an early age and hunted down if families don’t turn them in voluntary. The argument goes that mages easily succumb to malevolent temptations or become consorts of demons. From there, they can cause havoc.

Of course, this doesn’t sit well with some mages, especially Anders who escaped the Chantry’s grasp. In the penultimate scene, he blows up the Kirkwall Chantry along with its leader the Grand Cleric Elthina — a seemingly good woman — and other innocents. It’s a blatant terrorist act that the player unknowingly abetted because as Hawke, the champion of Kirkwall, players helped Anders gather materials for his blast.

Dragon Age: Origins was two different games. On the console, it was capable but average role-playing game. It offered hours of content and a combat system that was deep but never fulfilled its potential on a controller. On the other hand, the PC version was a vast improvement. Sure it was the same game with better visuals (depending on your rig), but the most important factor was that the spiritual successor to Baldur’s Gate felt as though it were built for mouse and keyboard.

The complexity and strategy revealed itself as players paused the game and planned out their attack. Moving around and scanning the battlefield was natural. Clicking and choosing what special move was easy and efficent.

The gap between the two versions was night and day. It was like playing an RTS on a console versus playing it on a computer.

Now, BioWare is making a second effort with the series. Dragon Age II arrives on March 8, and I had a chance to play a demo that’s going to be released Feb. 22. It’s a pretty hefty chunk of game (It takes about 45 minutes to complete.) and it’ll give players an opportunity to sample the improvements to the RPG.